


Foolproof

by Ptolemia



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), 悪魔城ドラキュラ | Castlevania Series
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Blood Drinking, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, I'll add tags as we go but I think this should get the gist of it across, M/M, Multi, Mutual Pining, Sharing a Bed, Sorry Not Sorry, anyway this fic is literally just a Dumb Trope Vehicle, but if it does I will warn for it!!, idiots to lovers, rated for Stuff Thats Going To Be In Future Chapters, side hector/isaac, so it may increase
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-02-17 23:14:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21651328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ptolemia/pseuds/Ptolemia
Summary: You know how it is; you start out by trying to invite a friend over for the holidays, and things escalate a bit, and then things escalate a bit more - and then before you know it you're about to spend a weekend surrounded by vampires, trying very hard not to get yourself killed, and desperately attempting not to fall for either of your best friends while pretending to date them both.But it's fine. All Trevor has to do is get through the weekend without catching feelings or a set of fangs in his neck, and then things can all go back to normal... right?
Relationships: Alucard | Adrian Tepes | Arikado Genya/Trevor Belmont/Sypha Belnades
Comments: 196
Kudos: 263





	1. Chapter 1

“Well,” says Trevor after a long, thoughtful silence; “I guess Hester might go on a date with you? I mean, I don’t know if you’re really each other’s type, but she could do it as a favour for me – or, like, she could fake-date you or something - and then technically that would mean _she_ could invite you, right?”

Sypha sighs. “Hester’s got a girlfriend.”

“She’s what?”

“I’m pretty sure she does, anyway. And Trevor, really, you should know this better than I do – she is your sister, after all.”

“Yeah, exactly, so we communicate exclusively in pictures of ugly cats and never share details of our personal lives.”

“Right.”

“That’s the epitome of a healthily functioning sibling relationship, Sypha. But- a girlfriend?! Since when?”

Sypha shrugs. “I saw her in the union coffee shop the other day with that friend of hers – Leah, is it? And, I mean, I don’t know for sure what’s going on there, but they were _definitely_ holding hands.”

“Holy shit,” says Trevor, shaking his head in disbelief, “god, that’s so fucking good. Mum is going to be livid.”

Sypha raises an eyebrow.

“Oh, not like that! It’s just that Leah is the reason for the ‘significant others only’ rule being a thing for the holidays in the first place. Hester brings her every year and they never fail to get high as shit and set fire to something, or flood all the bathrooms, or collapse the roof into the living room-”

“Oh dear,” says Sypha.

“Yeah, not ideal. Especially because it was hailing all weekend that year, and we couldn’t get anyone out to fix it until after Boxing Day.”

“That sucks. But… your sister and Leah also sound kind of cool for doing it. You know – I mean, you have to respect the chaos, right?”

Trevor nods, sagely. “Oh, yeah, for sure. But anyway, mum didn’t want to ban Leah specifically because she knew Hester would kick off, so she just said that it’s significant others only this year.”

“Ah. That makes sense, I guess.”

“Yeah, well, it’s backfired on her now, huh? Mind you, it’s also backfired on us. I wonder if there’s some other way to get you an invite?”

Sypha scratches her head thoughtfully. “Maybe if I drive up that way, and then we stage accidentally bumping into each other in town, and then I say that my car has broken down- no, wait, that won’t work, I don’t have a car-”

On the far side of the room, Adrian throws down his newspaper with an exasperated sigh. “Oh honestly, are you both stupid?”

“Yes?” says Trevor.

“Only when you two are around,” says Sypha; “I can feel my brain cells depleting just looking at you. Between hanging out with you guys and the Chemistry revision,” she motions morosely at the notes spread out on the floor in front of her, “I’ll never make it to graduation with an actual functioning, intact brain. It’s sad, really. I had so much potential.”

Adrian ignores her. “Look, isn’t it obvious? You can just… date each other.”

Trevor feels his stomach drop, plummeting straight through the floor and heading swiftly off toward the centre of the earth. “What?”

He doesn’t dare catch her eye, but out of the corner of his vision he can see Sypha going ever so slightly red around the ears as she wheezes, “Pardon?!”

Adrian waves a dismissive hand. “ _Fake_ date each other. Whatever. And then Sypha gets to spend the holiday doing something a bit more fun than moping around Bean Scene drinking more caffeine than can possibly be good for her-”

“Ok, first off,” says Sypha, waving her coffee cup at him, “my caffeine intake is perfectly reasonable-”

“Then why is your hand shaking?”

Sypha glares at her hand until it stills slightly. “Alright, well, maybe today I’ve had a tiny bit more coffee than was strictly necessary – but I have a test tomorrow! I’m studying!”

Adrian sighs. “No you’re not. You’re invading my living room trying to come up with hare-brained schemes to crash Trevor’s family holiday, and blatantly ignoring the one obvious solution that any normal person would have come up with half an hour ago.” He shakes his head, picks up the newspaper again, and flips it back open with a sigh.

“Alright,” says Trevor, before Sypha can respond, “but we can’t- I’m not going to fake date Sypha. That would be weird.”

Adrian licks his thumb and flips a page. “Would it?”

“Yes!”

“Why?”

“Because I- because it- well, it just would,” Trevor manages, a bit limply. “I don’t know.” He narrows his eyes, “why do I get the feeling that you’re setting us up for something here?”

Adrian glances over the top of the paper and rolls his eyes. “I am setting you up. Fake setting you up, anyway. That’s the whole point.”

“Yeah, but- setting us up for something _bad_. You know what I mean. What’s the punchline?”

“The punchline, Belmont, is that Sypha can’t afford to fly home for the holidays, you have a family home conveniently close, and by pretending to date one another you can easily ensure that you both have a significantly more enjoyable time than you would alone. Also, if you’re both in the same place then I can call and speak to both of you at once, which will be nice.” He sighs. “Not everything is a fucking rug-pull – Sypha, tell him I have a point.”

Trevor turns to Sypha, who shrugs. “He… has a point.”

“Urgh,” says Trevor, “I hate when you say that.”

Sypha scratches her nose. “You’re going to need to buy me some earplugs, though. I’ve seen you napping in the library; I know how loudly you snore.”

“I don’t- I can’t help that!”

“I’m not saying you can help it - I’m just saying that it’s annoying and I don’t want to be kept up all night.”

“Well,” says Trevor, “lucky for you, I have a single bed back home, so you won’t have to share - and the guest bedrooms are all in a completely different wing of the house to mine, so-”

“Different wing of the house,” snorts Sypha, “of course, because your family are all fucking… lords or whatever-”

“Technically just my dad, but-”

“You know, I always forget your family are like, minor nobility, because you dress like, well,” she waves a vaguely derisive hand in his direction, “…that.”

Trevor glances down at his completely reasonable – alright, so the trousers have seen better days, and his hoodie might have some ambiguous stains, and his shoes are wearing through at both ends now, but other than that _totally fine_ – outfit, and then back at her. “Like what?”

Behind the newspaper, Adrian snorts.

Trevor flips him off without even looking. “I’m comfortable!”

Sypha shakes her head. “I’m sure you are. It’s a shame, though – my mum would be delighted to hear I’m dating a nobleman; I haven’t managed to get her to shut up asking me about ‘have you found your prince?’ since I moved to St Andrews, I swear. But if I sent her a photo of you, she would think you were some kind of wild man I had found out in the woods. She would be concerned for my safety.”

“Hey!”

“And my sanity, come to think of it.”

“Oh, fuck off,” says Trevor, but there’s no real sting in it. “Anyway, nobility is one thing, but if it’s a _prince_ you want to fake date, you’re asking the wrong guy. Right, Adrian?”

Adrian peers over his newspaper with an expression of vague alarm. “What?”

“Weren’t you going on about this the other day in The Rule?”

Trevor can hear Sypha snickering as Adrian goes slowly pink, “I don’t-” he mumbles, trying to sink back behind his paper.

“Yeah,” says Trevor, “no, I’m pretty sure you were yelling something about being the Prince of Darkness-”

“-and then we had to haul your scrawny ass out of there before you started a fight with one of the rugby boys,” says Sypha, wiping away a tear. “Ah, good times.”

Adrian groans behind his paper. “I- look, I would have won, if that counts for anything.”

“Right,” nods Sypha, “which is why we had to haul you off before you got yourself arrested for beating the shit out of some random human who had the nerve to tell you that you’re not really the Prince of Darkness.”

Adrian makes another vague wounded noise and slumps his head into one hand, crumpling up the paper with the other. “Look. Obviously I know that I’m not- I don’t-” he sighs. “In my defence, I was extremely drunk - which is definitely your fault, both of you, for mixing that fucking punch. And- and I was wearing a lot of glitter. I- it brings something out in me.”

“Ok Edward Cullen,” snickers Sypha, laughing harder as Adrian fixes her with a dead-eyed glare, “whatever you say.”

“So you’re not really the Prince of Darkness?” gasps Trevor, hands flying to his mouth in mock astonishment. “How could you lie to us like that?”

Adrian peeks out from between his fingers. “I… it’s more of an honorary title,” he mumbles.

Sypha cackles - and Trevor takes the brief moment of distraction as Adrian cringes back behind his hand to snatch the newspaper out of his grip and smack him over the head with it.

Sypha allows them a good thirty seconds of senseless violence before she clearly reaches the limit of her patience, flinging an ice wall up between them as Adrian lands an inhumanely powerful punch which sends Trevor flying across the room to land on the sofa with an alarming creaking sound.

Trevor wheezes, blinking up at Sypha through a faint haze of feathers. “Aww, come on, we were just having fun.”

“Yes, come on,” says Adrian, from the other side of the ice wall, “we have to practise our skills somewhere, don’t we? What will we do if we all get attacked by errant-”

“-vampires,” says Trevor.

“-hunters,” says Adrian.

They glare at each other through the ice.

“You are going to break the flat,” says Sypha, sternly, “and then you will get attacked by _me_.”

“I can break it if I want to,” says Adrian, folding his arms. “It’s my flat.”

“It might be your flat,” says Sypha, “but other people live in this building, you know – you should be more considerate. And if you get kicked out, I won’t be able to come and revise in a room that’s actually warm and not filled with black mold. So. Get it together, please.”

They both grumble, but neither move to pick up their fight again when she dissolves the ice wall into air with a wave of her hand.

“You’re getting good at that,” says Adrian, dusting his elegantly cut jacket off and settling himself back in his armchair with an approving nod.

Sypha beams. “Thank you! I’ve been practising. Talking of which…”

She leans over Trevor on the couch and touches his cheek, something mischievous dancing behind her eyes. “We should kiss.”

He blinks up at her, not quite sure if he’s heard right. “Wh-” he manages, after a moment, “What?!”

She grins. “Well, if we’re going to fake date, we’re going to have to learn how to fake kiss, right? I mean, we’re not going to sell it super well to your family if we can’t even do a little peck on the lips now and again.”

“I-” Trevor turns to Adrian for – well, he’s not totally sure why, actually, he just does - but Adrian has sunk down into his chair and has lifted up his paper. He’s pretending very hard to read it, but he’s definitely pretending – the paper is crumpled to hell and back, torn in at least six places, and, most damningly of all, upside-down.

Sypha laughs, and gives him a friendly shove, her eyes warm as she shifts back away from him. “We don’t have to.”

Trevor grabs her hand. “No!” he says, “I mean, yes, uh- I mean. That’s. You’re right. That’s probably a good idea.”

Sypha kisses him. Its soft, and chaste, and over in a second, and Trevor thinks – huh. _Huh_.

She raises an eyebrow at him. “Not so bad?”

“Not… yeah,” he says, after a moment. “Yeah, not awful, I guess.” He wouldn’t mind doing it again, he thinks, maybe. Probably. Definitely. Oh shit.

She laughs. “Good! I think" she says, turning to Adrian with a cheery grin, "that this plan of yours might actually work.”

“Yes,” he mumbles, still not looking up from his shredded newspaper. “It's foolproof.”

Sypha laughs. “It would need to be, for us to pull it off.” Then she turns back to Trevor. “Hey, let go of my hand, dipshit - I want to go and get more coffee.”

He blinks, and looks down, and– oh, yes. Sure enough, there he is, still holding her hand too tightly for her to slip away. Oops. “Oh,” he grunts, feeling the heat creeping up his neck, “uh, right. Yeah. Sorry.”

It’s a few minutes after she’s gone before he speaks. “Probably should have stopped her getting more coffee,” he mumbles, still slightly dazed for reasons he can’t quite understand.

Adrian lowers the remnants of his newspaper, and shrugs. “Probably. Mind you, I could murder a pumpkin spice latte. Might send her a text and see if she’ll grab me one. Want anything?”

“Uh… black americano,” says Trevor, after a moment’s thought.

Adrian pulls his phone out. “Right. Two… pumpkin… spice… lattes…” he says, slowly, as he types.

“I said-” begins Trevor, but Adrian cuts him off with a glare.

“I know what you said, dipshit. But I also know you, and I don’t want to share my fucking drink. Now, do you want cream?”

Trevor frowns and folds his arms.

“Do you?”

“… yes.”

Adrian grins at him. “Ah, a man after my own heart.”

It’s another few minutes before Trevor speaks again. “Hey, Adrian?”

“Hmm?” says Adrian, now sprawled across the floor with his own revision notes out, pen in hand.

“What’s the difference between a fake kiss and a real kiss?”

Adrian gives him a very peculiar look, before turning back to his revision with a sigh. “You know, Belmont, I think I might let you figure that one out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uhhh so. now. now i know i have another wip right now but LISTEN
> 
> I was possessed by a deep need to write this and WHO am I to say no to THE MUSE?
> 
> for those wondering: yes, they will all end up fake-dating, mutually, this is just the initial setup. and yes, I did read the student prince, and it slapped, and the idea of st andrews as a university where there are also magic users has never left me. also i... know the area quite well so it's easier for me than setting it at an american uni or sth. also, Bean Scene was a real coffee shop - it got renamed (several times), but I liked the first one the best so I kept it. oh and trevor is jewish. sypha was brought up with Religion Soup because she has a huge big family and they all come from different traditions. adrian is none religion with left catholic. none of this is really going to come up but i like to think about it so that's your fun fact for the day.
> 
> also - huge HUGE thanks to @darthcas125 on twitter for giving me the idea of how to structure 'fake dating but there's three people' and therefore allowing this fic to exist at all
> 
> comments and kudos are the primary diet which sustain and nourish the Trope Machine, and I love and appreciate anyone who leaves them very much <3


	2. Chapter 2

Trevor hauls himself out of the shower with a groan as the pounding on the door starts up again, this time accompanied by the muffled noise of Sypha yelling at him to open up. After a moment, Alucard’s voice joins in. Trevor sighs and lumbers out into the hall – and then he pauses, turns on his heel, and heads back into the bathroom to grab a towel. Probably best not to flash the whole street when he lets them in.

As it turns out, he doesn’t get a chance to let them in, because just as he reaches out to grab the handle, Adrian wrenches the door straight off its hinges.

“What the fuck?!” splutters Trevor.

“Has Hester called?” asks Sypha, barely pausing to make eye contact before barrelling past Trevor and into the flat.

“I- no- what… my door?”

Adrian steps over the threshold and gingerly props the door up against the twisted remnants of its hinges. “Ah. Yes. I’ll um- I’ll fix that properly later. So she’s not called?”

“She… no? What’s going on?”

Adrian shakes his head and tails Sypha into the living room, where he sinks into an armchair as she paces furiously back and forth across the floor.

Trevor stares at them both for a moment. Adrian’s in one of his sharper suits, his hair tumbling with artful nonchalance over the velvety black shoulders of his well-fitted jacket. Sypha’s wearing dark blue, a form-fitting dress with a faint hint of sparkle and glittering silver earrings to match. Trevor doesn’t really bother dressing up unless he’s been forced to, but he can appreciate a good outfit when he sees one, no matter what anyone thinks. Mind you, those two would look good in paper bags. They’d look good in something stupider than a paper bag. They’d look good in _nothing_.

Adrian catches his gaze and raises an eyebrow. “What?”

Trevor grunts, abruptly aware that he’s been staring. “I- uh, you both look… nice. I guess. Date go well?”

“What do you think?” says Sypha, gesturing back toward the hallway where the front door is still just about visible, leaning wonkily against its broken hinges.

“Fake date,” corrects Adrian. “But yes, it went, ah… less smoothly than I might have liked.”

“Yeah?”

Adrian nods. “Yes, we, uh, ran into a spot of trouble and we might have- that is to say, we did leave a few people with the impression- that is… uh…” He turns to Sypha, eyes wide and appealing. “You tell him.”

“Why can’t you- urgh. Fine.” She sighs, steepling her fingers and shaking her head, “So, Trevor, before I explain anything, you have to understand we- we may have panicked.”

“No, hang on, _you_ panicked,” says Adrian, “You were the one who started this, telling my parents that we-”

“Yeah, well, you weren’t saying anything!”

“And you were saying too much!”

She glares. “Neither of us come out of this looking good, Adrian! I was just- I was very stressed out, and everything was about to go to hell and, well, I just came out with the first thing I could think of. Okay?”

Trevor blinks. “What’s going on?” He knows that whatever it is it must be serious, because he’s just answered the door wearing only a towel and Sypha hasn’t even made a single joke about delivering a big sausage pizza.

Adrian puts his head in his hands. “I knew this was a mistake.”

Sypha comes to sit down next to him with a heavy sigh. “I don’t know. But all rights it shouldn’t have been - it worked fine with Trevor!”

Trevor frowns. “What did?”

“Fake dating,” says Sypha. “Which is weird, really. I mean, by all rights your family should have smelled a rat in seconds, given how supremely out of your league I am-”

“Hey!”

“- but Adrian… I don’t know. I would have thought that it would be easier believe us two being a thing, honestly; I mean, he at least bothered to wear clothes that don’t have huge holes in them to our fake date, unlike _some_ people. And it was only supposed to be for the one evening, you know? By rights that should have made it much easier to maintain the fiction, and yet…”

Adrian cuts her a baleful stare from between his fingers. “Oh, come on. You are Trevor have more believable chemistry, that’s obvious.”

“I consider that a deep and unforgivable insult to my mediocre amateur dramatic talents,” says Sypha, shaking her head in disapproval.

“That’s bollocks, Adrian,” says Trevor; “Sypha could fake date anyone she wanted to. She was the third tree from the back in the panto at the Byre theatre last year, you know - she’s a woman of many talents.”

Adrian shrugs, but he looks unconvinced. “Sure. Whatever.”

Sypha pats his arm gently. “In any case, silly, the problem wasn’t that we weren’t convincing, was it?”

He hesitates, then, after a moment, inclines his head a fraction. “I suppose that, in fairness, it was actually going alright until Hester and Leah showed up-”

At which point Trevor’s phone rings. He glances down at the lock screen. “Oh,” he says, “speak of the devil – it’s Hester.”

Sypha and Adrian both leap out of their seats.

“NO!” yells Adrian.

“TREVOR WAI-” begins Sypha, and then claps her hands over her mouth, eyes wide with horror, as Trevor swipes up to answer and raises the phone to his ear.

“Hi Hes-” he begins.

The resulting storm of static makes him fling the phone out to arm’s length. For a moment he thinks the phone must be on speaker, but then he realises, no, she’s just yelling _that_ loudly.

“-dating DRACULA’S SON?!” shrieks Hester.

“Wait, what?” says Trevor.

“You’re dating. Dracula’s. Son. You-”

Trevor raises an eyebrow at Adrian, who mouths, ‘ _yes_ ,’ eyes wide.

Sypha is next to him, clutching the arm of his sleek black suit jacket and nodding furiously.

Trevor narrows his eyes, giving them both a look which he hopes sufficiently portrays that they _seriously owe him one for whatever the fuck this bullshit is_ , and then shrugs and says, “Sure. Yeah. I am… definitely doing that.”

“You- oh my god,” says Hester, “Trevor, are you insane? Don’t answer that. Why- what-?”

“He’s just so sexy,” says Trevor, mostly because he wants to watch Adrian squirm. “I mean, can you blame me? He’s so tall. And he has great legs. And his personality is just so… uh…” Trevor contemplates Adrian, who is scowling through a beetroot-red blush and flipping him off with both hands. “Well,” says Trevor, after a moment’s thought, “maybe the less said about his personality the better. He’s hot, anyway.”

Hester groans. “This is tragic. It’s like I got all the good Belmont genes this generation, and you and the rest of the babies got all the shitty genes that make you behave like idiots.”

“Firstly,” says Trevor, indignantly, “I’m not a baby, I’m the second oldest, so-”

“So a baby.”

“Shut up!”

“Stop side-tracking me! I’m interrogating you.”

“Right. Ok. Carry on.”

“So you’re… right, let me get this straight. You’re dating Dracula’s son.”

“Yup.”

“And you’re also dating the sexy wizard girl you brought home over the holidays?”

“I, uh…” Trevor frowns, and catches Sypha’s eye. Is he dating the sexy wizard girl? Great question. Sypha fist pumps at the description, then hurriedly nods at Trevor when he catches her eye. Huh. Alright. This is a new one. “Yes,” he says, slowly, and then – as Adrian and Sypha both give him enthusiastic thumbs up, “yeah, for sure. My two beloved partners. Sexy vampire guy and sexy wizard girl. Or- I mean, sexy wizard woman, right? It feels derogatory to call her-”

“And you realise,” says Hester, sounding far too cheerful for Trevor's liking, "that mum is going to skin you alive when she finds out you're dating _Dracula's son_?”

“Uh,” says Trevor, who is just at this moment realising that this may in fact be the case. God, Adrian and Sypha better have a damn good reason to be throwing him in it like this. “Ah. Shit.”

He can practically _hear_ Hester’s smug grin. “Shit, indeed.”

Trevor sighs. “Alright, but she doesn’t know, does she? So-”

“Not yet.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Hester chuckles. “What do you think it means?”

“You’re such a fucking- come on, you’re not gonna tell mum.”

Hester says nothing. She just waits, like a cat outside a mouse hole.

Eventually, Trevor sighs. “Oh, fine. Fine. What do you want?”

“Ah, Trevor. I’m so glad you understand me. Now, my first demand relates to the washing-up rota back home. I’m going to need you to-”

Trevor glares balefully up at Sypha and Adrian as Hester begins to enumerate her demands – the pair of them have the decency, at least, to look apologetic about it, but that doesn’t mean he’s not mad. He puts his hand over the phone as Hester continues to cackle down the line like some kind of third-rate horror movie villain, and mouths, “You’d better make this worth my fucking while.”

They both nod furiously.

“We will,” whispers Sypha. “We’ll do anything.”

“Anything,” Adrian agrees, looking distinctly frazzled.

“We’ll do the late-night pizza orders for the next _month_.”

“Absolutely.”

“We’ll pay you.”

“We will!”

“We’ll suck your dick.”

“We’ll suck your- wait, no, hang on,” splutters Adrian, his cheeks going distinctly pink, “We’re not- Sypha!”

She puts a hand over her mouth, trying desperately to smother her giggles, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I just wanted to see if you’d say it. Also,” she says, turning back toward Trevor as she wipes away a delighted tear from the corner of her eye, “honestly, genuine off-”

Trevor glares, putting his hand back over the phone, and hisses, “Can you two quit making dick jokes for _two fucking seconds_? I’m trying to talk to my sister.”

Sypha looks like she’s about to say something, but Adrian elbows her in the ribs quickly enough to stop her in her tracks.

Eventually, once Hester has finished enumerating her many and varied blackmail demands (honestly, not as exhaustive or as cruel a list as she could have imposed – she must approve, on some level), Trevor puts the phone down with a sigh and turns back to his two friends. “So,” he says, slowly, “Can either of you tell me what the fuck that was about, and why I just signed up to bring my sister coffee before her Friday lectures for the next three weeks? I’m guess this is somehow related to your date?”

“Fake date,” says Adrian.

“Urghhhhh,” says Sypha, her head dropping into her hands. “Oh, what a mess.”

Adrian sighs. “Indeed. So, Trevor as you know, we decided to capitalise on the success that you and Sypha had fake dating last month-”

“Right,” nods Sypha, “because Adrian’s parents are in town and they wanted to see him, and his mum has kept asking if he’s met anyone here and-”

“I just wanted to make her happy!” says Adrian, glumly. “I had good _intentions_.”

Sypha pats his arm. “You did, and to your credit I think it was all going pretty well, but then Hester and Leah showed up-”

“- and obviously they recognised Sypha as, well, your girlfriend-”

“Ah,” says Trevor, as every bizarre thing that’s happened so far tonight clicks into place all at once with a disarmingly abrupt certainty. “Oh, shit.”

“Exactly,” says Adrian, dryly.

Trevor massages his temples. “Just… tell me nobody is dead.”

“Nobody is dead.”

“Thank god. And nobody injured, either, I hope?”

Adrian and Sypha exchange glances. After a moment, Adrian says. “Nobody has been seriously injured. Uh. I don’t think so, anyway.”

“Oh my-”

Sypha waves a hand, “It’s fine, I fixed it, nobody even needed to go to hospital. Just some scrapes and bruises. But-”

Trevor sighs heavily, padding over to the open kitchen door. “Keep talking, I’m listening. I just need a drink for this.”

“Understandable,” says Sypha, solemnly. “Now, where were we…”

“Leah and Hester.”

“Leah and Hester! Yes, so, Hester came over and started making quite a fuss, because, uh, well, I suppose me being clearly there as Adrian’s date didn’t look great, since she thought I was dating _you_ , and-”

“I imagine it looked pretty awful, really, from her perspective,” says Adrian, “so, yes, she stormed over and started quizzing Sypha about it, and my father was, uh, not incredibly happy to hear that my supposed girlfriend was also seeing a _Belmont_ on the side-”

“Yes, exactly, and then Adrian’s dad got a little, uh, well, he was not so happy about the situation, so-”

“My father threw a table at your sister,” says Adrian, sounding about as exhausted as Trevor feels.

Trevor cracks a beer open as he slouches back into the room. “Alright, not to take Dracula’s side, but… fair play. What then?”

“She snapped a leg off it and threatened to stake him.”

“Ah,” says Trevor, faintly.

“Right,” says Sypha, “so, you can see that it was a pretty dire situation, so I just, you know, tried to say what I could to defuse it…”

Adrian groans. “I still can’t believe you did this.”

She ignores him. “… and, uh, well, I just sort of… said we were all dating each other? Like, that all three of us were- look, I panicked! But it worked, right?! Nobody ended up dead, at least!”

“That’s a low bar,” says Adrian, glumly. “But yes, I suppose it could have been worse. Everyone stopped trying to kill each other once she’d said that, anyway. Although I don’t think anybody was particularly pleased about it. Other than my mother. She was _delighted_.”

Sypha sighs as she turns back toward Trevor. “Anyway, the point is – you need to help us maintain the fiction. Just for a bit! We can stage a very amicable breakup somewhere down the line, but-”

“Exactly,” says Adrian, “just something… I don’t know, say we’re all better as friends and go back to normal, but, for now-”

“For now we’re all dating and we’re very happy about it, ok? Because if not, then I think that Adrian’s dad might still decide to kill your sister.”

“I imagine she would probably try to kill him, too, in fairness,” says Adrian, with a knowing shake of his head. “Either way, the Belmont truce has been going strong for the past, what, hundred and fifty years? I really don’t want to be responsible for it getting broken just because I couldn’t bear to tell my mum that yes, I am actually still single and I really do spend every Friday night in the library. So… please? Take one for the team?”

They both turn toward Trevor, gazes appealing and not a little desperate. He takes one look at them, both still in their slightly ruffled evening wear, perched on the edge of his ratty old sofa with wide, worried eyes, and he grins.

“Sure,” he says, taking a couple of paces forward and flopping down on the sofa between them with a snort, “yeah, because more fake dating will definitely solve the mess that fake dating has got us into so far.”

“Well, you know,” says Sypha, “hair of the dog, and all that…”

Trevor chuckles. “I actually think you might be right. Just gotta wait for it to blow over and stage a breakup - we can manage that, right?" He wiggles the beer can at her. “Want a swig?”

“Oh, please.”

He hands her the can, and when she passes it back, he turns to Adrian. “You want-”

He wrinkles his nose. “Do you have any wine?”

Trevor scratches his head. “Got some Echo Falls in the back of the fridge somewhere, I think.”

“So no,” says Adrian. “God, Belmont, you’re such a heathen.”

“You love it!”

“I most certainly do not.”

“You do – we’re dating now, remember?”

Adrian groans. "Fine, fine, I'll drink your shitty wine. Just- don't expect me to like it."

"Aww," says Sypha, swiping Trevor's beer and taking another large swig, "look, you really do like each other!"

They both flip her off at the same time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will check in the am for spelling and grammar errors but it's late and I need validation so... here's somethin. 
> 
> are there other ways this could have been resolved? yes. but do our three intrepid heroes all low-key kinda like the idea of 'fake' dating? also yes. so....
> 
> as always comments and kudos feed and sustain me!!


	3. Chapter 3

Trevor squints down at his textbook, scratches his head slowly, and - after a long moment - tilts it to one side.

The words, shockingly, don’t make any more sense at a forty-five degree angle. He sighs, and flips the book back.

Sypha, sat across from him with an empty box of shortbread squares and a sympathetic expression, raises an eyebrow. “Do you want another coffee?”

Trevor sighs. “I’ve had too many.”

“Water?”

“Got some.” He shakes his half-empty bottle at her morosely.

“Quick walk?”

“I don’t think that’s gonna cut it at this point.” He sighs again and rubs his eyes blearily before stretching himself out and yawning loudly. “Honestly, I think I’ve just done too much work today. I’m exhausted. How long have we been here?”

Sypha glances at the library clock. “Like… twenty minutes?”

“Ah.”

“And you’ve already skipped your first two lectures today! You can’t miss study group too.”

“Well, yes, but in fairness- see, the thing is, I needed the sleep so that I’d be energised for this afternoon-”

“Adrian isn’t even here yet!”

“… right. Yeah. I guess I’ll give it another ten minutes, then.”

Sypha rolls her eyes at him, and pulls another box of shortbread squares out of her oversized satchel. “See, that attitude is why you’re a humanities major.”

Trevor just shrugs – and then, as soon as she turns her attention back to the satchel and her guard is lowered, he whips his water bottle directly at her head.

“You _dickhead!_ ” she shrieks, managing to duck aside at the last moment, but scattering shortbread everywhere in the process.

He winks. “Guilty as charged.”

She flings the water bottle back at him, and it thunks off his chest – he winces, and picks it up. It appears that it is now filled simply with a solid block of ice. He raises an eyebrow at Sypha, who blinks innocently up at him.

“Oops,” she says.

He contemplates chucking it back at her, for a moment, but a glance over at the librarian’s desk tells him that it might not be a wise idea. Luckily they’re on the ground floor, which is a fairly lawless zone when it comes to noise levels, food and drink, and senseless violence, but there _is_ a limit. And if they get themselves kicked out of the library for the third time this semester, they might not get let back in, and then he won't have anywhere to go when he wants to pretend he's being productive for an hour or two. So instead he just laughs, puts the water bottle away, and holds out his hand toward her. “Alright, truce?”

She grins. “Truce.” She reaches out to shake his hand, but her eyes drift down toward the shortbread on the floor. “So, are we-”

“Five second rule,” says Trevor, who’s already abandoned even the pretence of a handshake in favour of kneeling down to scoop shortbread off the floor and directly into his mouth.

“Five second rule,” agrees Sypha, sliding off her chair to join him with an expression of utter relief, “god, it’s so nice to finally know somebody who really _understands_ -”

“What the fuck are you two doing?” asks Adrian, appearing abruptly before them like some kind of demigod in Ray-Bans, haloed in the fluorescent library lights and wearing what must be the tightest pair of jeans Trevor has ever seen.

“Hhhh- uh… shortbread?” he mumbles, slightly dazed.

“Five second rule!” adds Sypha, grabbing the last piece and shoving it her mouth before hopping back up onto her chair with a self-satisfied grin.

“Christ,” says Adrian, lowering his sunglasses and blinking disapprovingly at them both, “I can’t believe that anyone here is buying the idea I would date _either_ of you, honestly.”

“It’s ‘cos we’re so sexy,” says Trevor, barrelling back into his seat before Adrian can steal it and wiping crumbs from his mouth with the back of his hand. “And good at revising. You’re late, you realise?”

“He’s right, you know,” says Sypha. “Uh, not about the revising thing, but you _are_ late - nearly half an hour! What kept you?”

Adrian glances from her to Trevor and back again. “Where’s my seat?”

“Erm, I think it got nicked by one of the other tables,” she says. “What-”

“Should have got here on time if you wanted a seat,” says Trevor.

“Well what am I going to-” Adrian groans, “there are never any free chairs at this time, I thought you guys would have saved me a-”

Sypha pats her knee and settles back in her chair with a sharkish grin. “Plenty of room over here," she says, with a wink.

Adrian looks, momentarily, like he’s going to collapse – and then he gathers himself, pockets his sunglasses, and takes her hand as she reaches for him and allows himself to be tugged into her lap with a contented little sigh.

She tucks a strand of hair behind his ever-so-slightly pointed ear, and kisses his nose. “So - what kept you?”

Trevor turns back to his textbook, feeling the back of his neck prickle with heat. On some level, he’s aware that he’s in danger. The literal sort, obviously – he’s not stupid, he’s noticed the sharp uptick in weirdly formally dressed 'students' hovering around his general vicinity who _really_ don’t like to be caught in the sunlight. That was probably to be expected. But he’s also in the other sort of danger, the one where Sypha is sat across from him, manspreading (womanspreading?) for England and kissing Adrian’s nose while he sprawls lazily over her lap like something out of a perfume advert and- oh and now they’re _kissing_ kissing.

Which they’re allowed to do, obviously. Got to maintain the whole dating charade, or Dracula might show up and start tearing people’s heads off, or… something like that, anyway. Right?

Trevor stares down at his textbook until the words start to spin. He’s just- right, the thing is, it’s not that he’s jealous. It’s not like he doesn’t get his share of kisses – not that he cares, of course. Why would he be jealous of kisses, anyway? It’s not like he wants his friends to kiss him, that would be- well, the point is, it’s just about keeping up the fake dating thing, that’s all. And, honestly, he wouldn’t even know which of them to be jealous of, so its not that, it’s… it’s just a bit awkward, is the thing. Like, maybe it’s nothing, and Sypha and Adrian are just both better actors than he thought, but lately he’s beginning to get the impression from the pair of them that they might be _actually_ dating each other, if it wasn’t for the whole fake dating mess. Which is nice! They’d be good together! It’s just sort of awkward, because that means Trevor’s sort of stuck in the middle, which- god, no, bad wording, don’t think about that- it’s not even- he’s not _trying_ to think about that, it’s just-

“Are you even listening, Trevor?” says Adrian.

Trevor almost jumps out of his seat. “I- what?”

Sypha waves an arm in front of his face. “Hello, earth to Trevor?” She snaps her fingers. “Hello? Anyone in there?”

“I-” begins Trevor.

She ignores him, turning back to Adrian with a sigh. “No, it’s just like I thought. He’s got no brain cells left at all. He’s completely incapable of thought.”

“Oh,” says Adrian, “well, lucky he’s handsome.”

Trevor blinks. “I’m what?”

“I said you’re ugly and I hate you,” says Adrian, without missing a beat. “Anyway, look, were you listening to any of that?”

“Yes?” says Trevor, and then, having appraised the total disbelief in their gazes; “… no.”

Adrian sighs, but it sounds fond enough. “Jesus, I swear, it’s impossible to have a conversation with you, sometimes. Anyway, I was just saying, this whole-” he lowers his voice slightly, “ _fake dating_ thing- well, it’s worked out pretty well.” He withdraws a slightly crumpled envelope from his pocket, and flings it at Trevor. “Look at this!”

The envelope is made of that sort of heavy cream bumpy paper that really rich people use when they want to show off about how much money they pissed down the drain on stationary. The lettering is so swirly Trevor can hardly make it out, but he recognises enough to know it’s addressed to Adrian. He flips it over and pulls out a sheet of paper with far too much gold leaf on it, and raises an eyebrow.

“This is a… wedding invitation?”

“Oh, great work, Mr Holmes,” says Adrian. Sypha elbows him in the stomach.

Trevor runs a thumb over the embossed edges as he reads. After a moment he scratches his head and frowns. “Who the fuck are Hector and Isaac?”

Adrian waves an airy hand. “Oh, my uncles- well, not my _uncles_ uncles, but, you know, people who you grow up with who are your relatives even if they’re not, uh, actually related-”

“I’m not going to a vampire wedding,” grunts Trevor.

“If you were listening,” says Sypha, “you would know that it’s not a vampire wedding. Hector and Isaac are both human, actually.”

“Thank you Sypha,” says Adrian, “anyway, that’s not the point, I-”

“Right, but there’s going to be vampires _at_ the wedding, right? And you’re dad’s going to be there?”

“Well, yes, most of the guests will be vampires, certainly, but-”

“Then as far as I’m concerned, it’s a vampire wedding and I’m not going!”

Adrian groans. “Look, read who it’s addressed to.”

Trevor looks down at the invitation. “To you?”

“And…?”

“Uh… plus one?”

“Right!”

Sypha coos delightedly, "Oh, well, that's alright then - I'll be your plus one, Adrian. I love a good wedding."

"Wait, no, that's not-" Trevor splutters, "no, you can't go either!"

She glares. “If I want to go to the fancy wedding with all the cool vampire guests then I can – who do you think you are, Trevor Belmont, trying to tell me what to-”

“Right, but you might- fine, okay, if you go, I have to go too, and I’m bringing my stakes and my holy water and my-”

“Oh, so I can’t look after myself, now? You know what, Trevor, sometimes you really-”

“The point,” says Adrian, cutting across them both, “is that it’s a plus _one_.”

They both turn toward him, heads tilted.

“Oh!” says Sypha.

“Right,” says Trevor. “So that means… wait, what does that mean?”

“It means,” says Adrian, taking the letter back and tucking it away into his pocket with barely repressed glee, “that I don’t have to go. I just got off the phone to my mother, and she agrees entirely – it just wouldn’t be fair at all to have to choose between my partners.”

Trevor whistles softly, impressed. “Alright, that’s a pretty good one, I’ll give you that.”

Sypha looks deflated. “But why wouldn’t you want to go to a wedding? I love weddings. They’re good! Double good if it’s a rich people wedding, which, clearly…”

Adrian shrugs. “I don’t mind them. But I know that aunt Carmilla is planning to crash this one, and honestly I could do without the hassle.”

“If she’s your aunt,” says Trevor, “how come she’s crashing the wedding? She’s not invited?”

“Oh, she’s never invited,” says Adrian; “Father hates her, he makes sure she’s not invited to anything he’s planning on attending. But she loves drama, so she always manages to get herself in anyway, somehow or another, and then I end up having to babysit her the whole time to try and make sure they don’t _actually_ kill each other, which is…” he shakes his head. “Anyway, it’s the weekend before one of my exams. I want a chance to actually study for it, you know?

“Uh, no,” says Trevor. “But, hey, good on you, uh… studying and stuff.”

Sypha sighs. “Oh, Trevor, really…”

“Anyway, look,” says Adrian, “I just wanted to say thank you to both of you. This has… turned out surprisingly well, all things considered. I'd been trying to get out of going to this wedding for ages, and now the perfect excuse has landed in my lap!”

“Well, of course it has,” says Trevor, “It's because we're all geniuses. We can’t possibly fail.”

“Honestly?” says Adrian, taking a long sip of Sypha’s coffee, “you’re right, and you should say it. I can't believe we've managed to pull this off, honestly.”

“Geniuses,” says Trevor, again. “Only explanation for that. We’re geniuses.”

“To be fair,” says Sypha, reaching around Adrian to scroll through to another article on her laptop, “a lot of people kind of thought we were dating anyway.”

“What?” says Adrian.

“What?!” says Trevor.

“Yeah, I mean-” She pauses, one hand still hovering over the keyboard. “Uh. Is this just my friends? Did none of you guys’ friends already think-”

Adrian blushes slightly. “Oh! Well. Yes, I… a few people, now you mention it. And my mother, actually. Called me up and told me she’d seen it coming a mile off.”

Sypha nods. “Right! Yeah, turns out a solid half of the Mermaids had a betting pool going about it - like, which one of you I was going to end up dating. Some people had money on both, even. Grant won fifty quid.”

“Not bad,” says Adrian.

“The- wait, mermaids?” says Trevor, because that’s the one part of what she’s just said that makes any sense at all, “Like, the ones down at the pier? We hardly even speak to them, why would-”

“No, no, not mermaids – _Mermaids_. The drama society.”

“Oh. Right. Yeah. That makes more sense.”

“Although, to be fair, some of the actual mermaids were also-”

At which point, Adrian’s phone rings. He glances at it half-heartedly, then sighs, and scrambles out of Sypha’s lap. “I’d better take this, sorry, it’s my mother again, I- yes, hello, yes, hi mum, it’s me, what did you…”

He trails off in between the bookshelves and vanishes.

Sypha yawns, and stretches her legs. “He’s heavier than he looks. I don’t think I can feel my legs any more.”

Trevor snorts. “Should have kicked him off.”

“No! You can’t do that. It’s like cats – once they’re sat on you, you can’t move them. It’s mean.”

“That’s definitely not a thing for people.”

“It is! Look, like this,” she says, standing up and skirting around the table to plonk herself unceremoniously down in Trevor’s lap. “See? Can’t move me.”

He raises an eyebrow, and tries very hard not to think about how warm she is, or how nice her hair smells. “I could. I could literally throw you across the room right now.”

“Physically, yes,” she says, resting her head against his chest and picking his textbook up off the table to leaf through, “but emotionally? Imagine the toll. It would destroy you.”

“I-” he sighs. “Yeah, alright, you have a point.”

“Mind you, I could probably set you on fire before you had a chance to throw me, in any case.”

“True.”

They sit like that, in companionable silence, for a minute or two. Eventually, Trevor says, “Did the Mermaids really have a betting pool?”

“Sure. Does that really surprise you?”

“It… uh, I mean, I guess I-”

“It makes sense to me, anyhow.” She tilts her head up to catch his eye, and she’s… huh. Very close to his face. He could kiss her, probably. For fake dating purposes, obviously.

Only he doesn’t get a chance to, because at that very moment Adrian reappears, puts his phone down on the table, and says, with feeling: “Shit. _Shit_.”

Trevor frowns. He looks paler than usual, somehow. “You look like crap. What-”

Sypha sits up straight. “Is everything alright?”

Adrian steeples his fingers. “Well…”

Trevor sighs. “Spit it out.”

“Uh, so, my mother just called to let me know that she, uh… well, she seems to have arranged things so that I can have a plus two to the wedding. Um. So…”

Sypha claps her hands, eyes lighting up. “So we can go?”

Trevor glares. “No way. No. Fucking. Way. I am _not_ going to a vampire wedding.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can you guess whats going to happen next chapter? i feel like this is where i wish you could put jump cuts in writing
> 
> anyway hope you are all safe and doing well, my life has currently somewhat collapsed which either means i'll write loads of fic or that i'll write none, not sure yet - but either way much love to you all and as ever comments and kudos sustain me and keep me properly fed and watered etc etc etc


	4. Chapter 4

“I still can’t believe I’m doing this,” groans Trevor, gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles are steadily turning white.

“I think it’s going to be fun,” says Sypha, and then; “Oooh, hey, can we stop at the next service station and get gummy worms?”

Trevor sighs. “We just stopped for coffee, could you not have-”

“Right, and I didn’t want gummy worms then, but I do now. So can we stop soon?”

“We-”

“Oh, shit, left here, left- no, the other left, Trevor!” Sypha gestures wildly, flapping the dog-eared map toward a fast-approaching turn-off. “That one!”

Trevor swerves, and just makes the exit. The car behind honks its horn loudly, and he flips it off in the mirror. “You know, rumour has it that the ‘other left’ is commonly known as ‘right’.”

“No, but I didn’t mean right – I was saying that the turning was on the left, but you tried to turn right and so I was pointing out-”

“I didn’t try to turn right, that was left, and then you got me to turn right-”

“No you- wait, hang on…” Sypha holds her hands out between with her thumbs and forefingers making L shapes. “Right, so, this one is left, so-”

“No, look, that one looks like an L, so that’s left, and the other one is right-”

“It’s backwards for you!”

“Yeah, I know, but it’s-”

“Do you both have to be absurd so _loudly_?” groans Adrian, sprawled out over the back seat and wincing up at the moth-eaten fabric of the car roof.

Sypha leans over her shoulder and chucks a scrunched-up bag of crisps at him. “Yes!”

Adrian swats it aside. “And does your car usually make this much noise? I feel like all this crunching can’t mean anything good for the engine.”

Trevor glances at Adrian’s pallid form in the rear-view mirror, and sighs. “It’s not our fault you’re hungover.”

“It’s not my fault that your car is falling apart! Why is it making so much _noise_?!”

“You know, it’s rare that I say this,” says Sypha, with a solemn nod, “but Trevor is actually right, for once; it isn’t our fault you’re hungover. Also, you should put your seatbelt on. He’s a shit driver.”

“I _am_ a shit driver,” says Trevor, sagely. “Go on, put your seatbelt on. I would hate to turn up at the wedding with a vampire pizza for a date because you’ve managed to go flying through the window and got yourself steamrollered.”

“Well, why don’t you try to stop braking all the time, and then that won’t happen?” grumbles Adrian, slowly hauling himself upright.

“Because I’m a shit driver – are you even listening to this conversation?”

Sypha turns and shakes her head. “Put your seatbelt on already, Adrian.”

“I’m doing it, I’m doing it! Urgh. My head is killing me. It feels like something _died_ in there.”

Trevor snorts. “I could have sworn you told me vampires can’t get hangovers. What happened to that?”

Adrian glowers at him from the backseat. “It’s not- urgh. _Vampires_ can’t. But I’m only half vampire, and I’m not- I didn’t… urgh.”

“What?”

He winces. “I keep forgetting to, uh… drink blood.”

Trevor sighs. “How do you _forget_ to drink blood?”

“I don’t know, Trevor,” says Adrian, pulling the fur-lined hood of his coat up over his head until it covers his eyes, “how do _you_ keep forgetting to take your antidepressants?

“Adrian!” gasps Sypha.

Trevor snort-laughs as he pulls out onto the motorway. “Yeah, alright, touché. Which, actually…” he frowns, idly patting at his oversized jacket pockets. “Did I… did I bring…”

There’s a growl from the back seat, and a small cardboard packet flies over Trevor’s shoulder to land on the dashboard. “No, you left them on my kitchen counter. Again.”

“God, I love you,” says Trevor, without really thinking about it - because that’s the sort of thing you say when a friend really comes through for you, isn’t it? Only suddenly, for some reason, it feels weird, like all of the air gets sucked right out of his lungs as soon as he’s said it. Like… like it maybe sounded like he meant it a bit too much, or something. So he keeps his eyes forward, grits his teeth, and does what he does best – keeps digging the hole. “You’re my _hero_ , darling,” he says, clutching a hand dramatically to his chest. “Really.”

He feels the tension in his chest ease slightly as Sypha snickers in the passenger seat, and tries not to sigh with relief when she twists her head round to coo at a scowling Adrian in the back. It’s a joke! They’re having a joke. Everything is fine.

“Shut up,” says Adrian.

At that, he grins. “No, really, you’re just the perfect fake boyfriend. So thoughtful and sexy and, uh…”

“Tall,” supplies Sypha.

“- tall! Exactly.”

“Great ass,” she adds, with a wicked glitter in her eyes.

“Oh, for sure,” agrees Trevor.

In the back, Adrian retreats further into his coat and whines. “I’m too hungover for this.”

“Yeah, well, you’re gonna have to put up with it,” says Trevor. “You owe me one for this bullshit.” He sighs. “A vampire fucking wedding. Can you believe it?”

“It’s not a vampire wedding,” says Sypha, calmly. “It’s a human wedding which happens to have some vampires in attendance.”

Trevor grits his teeth. “Yeah, but- I mean, Dracula is the best man. Dracula! Why am I doing this, again?”

“Because you love us.”

“I-” Trevor feels the back of his neck prickle with heat again, but he ignores it. It’s just a joke, after all. And anyway, he does love them - just like anyone loves their best friends. Totally normal. No need to make it weird. It’s not weird. Everything is fine.

“Trevor?” says Sypha, cocking her head in vague confusion as the pause stretches out just a fraction of a second too long.

He grunts. It’s not weird. It’s not weird! Stop overthinking it! So he says, “Well, yeah, alright, I do, obviously, or I wouldn’t be here. But- vampires, Sypha! And I’m not even allowed to bring my whip into the venue!”

Adrian makes a vague noise from under his coat that may or may not be broadly sympathetic.

Sypha yawns. “I know, I know. But it’s just the one weekend, at least. After this, we give it a week or two and then we can all just say it didn’t work out and everything goes back to normal. Right?”

“Oh, sure, as long as nobody gets their head ripped off before we get to that point.” He glances at the rear-view mirror again. “Oy, Adrian, did you think about that tiny detail before you landed us in it with this one? I might get my whole head ripped off. I could be eaten alive! What do you have to say to that?”

Adrian mumbles something that sounds distinctly like ‘at least you wouldn’t be making so much noise’ – but then Sypha turns to fix him with a hard stare, and he begrudgingly mumbles a quick, “Yeah, alright, thank you Trevor. And Sypha.”

Trevor grunts. “You’re stressed.”

“Oh,” says Adrian, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “you can tell?”

“Yeah, I can, because you’re always a massive fucking bitch when you’re stressed.”

“Yes, well- look, of course I- of course I’m stressed! This whole situation is absurd, how did we even manage to get ourselves into this-”

“Erm, not to interrupt,” says Sypha, with a sudden hint of trepidation in her voice that makes Trevor sit up and pay attention, “but I think we need to pull over, like, now.”

Trevor glances at a road sign as they pass. Services, half a mile. He sighs. “I know you want gummy worms, but-”

“No, I mean – well, Adrian mentioned the noise earlier, and I know we’re all used to your car being a shitbag but… the crunching _is_ weird, right?”

“It always makes that…” Trevor tails off, brow furrowed, and listens for a moment. “Ah. Yeah, no, the crunching sound is new, but…” he glances at the blinking clock on the dashboard. “Look, it’s getting late – I’m sure we can make it into London, and then we’ll just have to deal with whatever’s wrong once we get there.”

“Right, yes,” says Sypha, “The other thing is, uh… well, I think something at the back is on fire?”

Trevor glances in the mirror and – oh, yep, sure enough, a steady stream of faint grey smoke is drifting up across the back window. “Ah. Shit.”

“I’m done,” says Adrian, grabbing Sypha’s coat from the empty seat beside him and pulling it over his head, “wake me up when the car explodes. I can’t handle it anymore. I just can’t.”

They limp into the service station at the slowest pace Trevor can manage, and as soon as the car comes to a stop he hops out and hurries round the back to take a look. After a moment he’s joined by Sypha, and then by a very dishevelled looking Adrian, who glares down at the car and says,

“Well, I can’t see any smoke.”

Trevor pops the boot, and hauls a suitcase out. “Yeah, I think maybe it was the weight of the boot pressing on the wheel? Is that how that works? Could that- Sypha, could that make smoke?”

She blinks at him. “How should I know?”

“You’re a scientist, aren’t you?”

“Yes, but I’m not- you’re the one who can drive! I don’t know anything about cars. Although – Jesus, Trevor, how much stuff have you got in there? That can’t be helping.”

Trevor sighs. “Uh, just, you know… your bag, Adrian’s suitcases, my bag, some… some other things… I’ll move some stuff onto the back seat and see if that helps.”

Adrian peers into the boot. “Is that- are those gallon bottles of holy water?”

“I- maybe?”

Adrian stares at him. “Seriously?”

“I’m not planning to use them! But I figured it was worth having some on hand, just in case…”

Adrian rolls his eyes, but helps Trevor haul holy water into the back seat without further complaint. Once that’s done, Trevor slams the boot and shrugs. “Well, it’s not smoking any more, so I say we get back in and see what happens.”

“Gummy worms?” says Sypha, eyeing the newsagent out front of the service station with a wistful expression.

“Yeah, sure, go grab some, me and Adrian will do couple laps of the car park and see if anything explodes.”

“Like fuck we will,” says Adrian, striding past him to link arms with Sypha, “I want snacks, too.”

“You want anything?” asks Sypha.

Trevor shakes his head. “Nah, I’m good, I’ll just steal some of yours.”

She flips him off.

When they return a few minutes later, Trevor has the hood of the car propped open, scratching his head thoughtfully as they approach.

Adrian groans. “What is it now?”

“Well,” says Trevor, “uh… this definitely looks like an engine.”

“It won’t start?” says Sypha.

Trevor nods. “It won’t start.”

“Oh my god,” says Adrian, “we’re screwed. We’re going to be stuck in this abysmal car park for eternity, as punishment for our sins.”

“It _does_ look like an engine,” says Sypha, pressing her shoulder up against Trevor’s as she comes to peer into the hood. “And we’re not going to be stuck here for eternity, we’ll just call- Trevor, you have breakdown cover, right?”

“Uh…” says Trevor.

“Trevor-”

“Honestly, I’m not even entirely sure I have insurance, and that’s a legal requirement, so-”

“Oh my god,” says Sypha.

“This is hell!” says Alucard. “What did I tell you? Clearly, Trevor has finally managed to get us all killed with his abominable driving, and now we’re all actually dead even though we haven’t realised it yet, and we’re doomed to an eternity stuck in a car park in- actually, where are we?”

“M1,” says Trevor.

“How far are we from London?”

Trevor shrugs. “An hour and a bit, I guess. Depends on the traffic.”

Adrian’s stormy expression clears. “Oh! Oh, that’s not so bad - I’ll just call my mother. She’s in town already for the wedding, so she can come pick us up.”

Sypha cheers. “Perfect!”

“We’ll have to work out what to do with your car, though,” he says, swiping his phone and wandering off a little way into the car park to make the call. “I’ll ask if she knows anyone who could come get it,” he calls over his shoulder as he disappears around the back of a rusty old truck.

Trevor stares down at the engine for another few seconds. “I actually don’t know what I opened the hood for, I have no idea what any of this is.”

Sypha shrugs. “Me neither. Oh well, at least we won’t be stuck here for long. We can just go sit in the coffee shop while we wait for Adrian’s mum.”

“I guess.” Trevor sighs as he pulls the hood shut. “Urgh. It’s not a great meet-the-parents impression, is it, though?”

“It- we’re not actually dating him, Trevor.”

“I know! But, still.”

Sypha hums in agreement. “Gummy worm?” she says, shaking the bag at him.

He sighs and takes one.

As he does, Adrian appears again out of the growing dusk, weaving between parked cars and frowning as he gestures at his phone, “… yes, there’s a- what is it – a Travelodge or something – at the service station, but… yes, I know. Right. Yes. Well- alright, yes, we can. Ok, alright, have fun. Yes. I love you! Bye.”

He pockets the phone and shakes his head as he approaches the car. “She can’t come tonight, something about floral arrangements needing fixing? I don’t know. Anyway, um, she said that if we crash at the motel here, she can come get us first thing tomorrow morning, and she’ll send somebody over for the car after that.”

Trevor shrugs. “Alright, well, I guess that’s what we’re doing, then.”

Adrian raises an eyebrow. “What, you’re not going to moan at me about it?”

“Nah. Figure it’s one less night surrounded by murderous vampires, right?”

“That’s what you think, Belmont,” says Adrian, snapping playfully at Trevor’s neck.

Trevor swats him away. “Fuck off!”

Sypha ignores them both, heading round the back of the car to start hauling suitcases out of the boot. “I hope you let your mum know we’re all very grateful for her offering to come get us,” she says, as Adrian trails after her to help.

“I’ll pass it on,” he says, lifting one of his suitcases out of the trunk. “I hope there’s space for all of our shit in the motel rooms.”

“Well, maybe if you hadn’t packed three suitcases for a four day trip…” says Sypha, pulling out her backpack and shouldering it smugly.

“I hope they have space for us in the motel at all,” says Trevor, resting a bottle of holy water on his hip. “We can leave some of this in the car, but if they don’t have rooms, we’re fucked.”

“They’ll have rooms,” says Adrian, waving a dismissive hand at him.

Trevor eyes the ominously busy car park for a long, careful moment. “Well,” he says, “if somebody ends up having to sleep in the car, it ain’t gonna be me. That’s all I’m saying.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh no... i sure hope.......... i hope theres more than one bed........... at the motel..................
> 
> hope yall enjoyed, I think that lockdown maybe is making me feral enough to actually do some consistent writing again, so that's something. i hope you are all doing well and are staying safe! 
> 
> as ever, huge thanks to everyone leaving comments and kudos, you make me very happy and i love u <3


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: blood drinking

“C’mon Adrian,” says Sypha, flopping forward so that the upper half of her body is entirely resting on Trevor’s chest, her elbows digging slightly into his breastbone, “it’s just a bed. You’ll be fine, I promise.”

Adrian shakes his head, kicking his heels against the legs of the flimsy motel table as he digs glumly through the bottom of a greasy paper bag for the last of the chips; “It just seems completely inconceivable that there’s not a single other room in this entire motel that isn’t occupied. Like, how-”

“It is a bank holiday, to be fair,” says Trevor, and then, “Sypha, fucking hell, why are your elbows so sharp?”

She winks at him. “Ah, you know… I consider it one of my many talents.”

“How the fuck is having sharp elbows a tale-”

Adrian crumples the paper bag, flinging into the bin with a mournful glare. “Maybe I’ll sleep in the car.”

“What?!” says Sypha, leaning abruptly forward onto Trevor’s chest and making him wince, “No, come on, get over here! It’s actually really not a bad bed at all, honestly. Pretty cozy.”

Adrian sighs. “It’s not the-”

“And I need to dig my elbows into you, too, or Trevor will start complaining that I’m playing favourites.”

“I-” he smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

Trevor gives Adrian’s hands – nervously folding and unfolding in his lap – an appraising glance, then grunts. “Look, you’re welcome to sleep in my car if you want to, but, uh… you realise we’re probably going to have to share a bed at the wedding, right?”

“Mmm,” says Adrian, absently shifting his weight on the table-top and leaning back to tap his shining black boots against the grubby motel chair before him.

Trevor frowns, trying to get a read on his expression. His face is tight, somehow – a pinching tension that lingers over his features, casting shadows in the hollows of his cheeks. Something’s off, that’s for sure, even if he can’t quite work out what it actually _is_. Perhaps… “If- hey, look, if the bed sharing thing makes you uncomfortable, we can always back out, right?” He nudges Sypha. “Right?”

“Oh!” Sypha’s eyes widen slightly, “Oh, right, yeah! Of course, yes. We can uh… we’ll break Trevor’s leg, or something.”

Trevor gapes at her. “What?!”

She grins. “What? I’m saying, we break your leg – or you could just break it yourself, I guess, but we’re good friends so of course we can help out if you need us to. We’re supportive like that. Either way, your leg gets broken and we blame it on wild… uh… wild… what vicious wild animals do you get in the UK, anyway?”

“Tories,” says Trevor.

Sypha snorts.

“Geese,” supplies Adrian, toying aimlessly with the hem of his jacket.

She claps her hands together. “Geese! Yes, we blame it on geese. It’s all very shocking, and of course you are bleeding profusely, Trevor, so we have to rush you to the hospital, and guess what? It turns out to be a really bad break, and so they wheel you off to surgery immediately, and then, you know, of course we have to miss the wedding to be with our poor injured boyfriend at the hospital while he recovers. No shared bed! Problem solved.”

“I’m still stuck on the part where you _break my leg_.”

Sypha throws her hands up. “I’m workshopping!” She glances at him, sidelong. “Would you prefer we break your arm?”

“I mean, no, not exactly-” begins Trevor, but Adrian cuts him off with a chuckle.

“Let’s not break Trevor,” he says, his voice dry even as he visibly fights back a smirk. “I appreciate the offer, though.”

“That’s more like it,” says Sypha, with a dignified nod. “At least somebody around here appreciates my plans.”

Trevor flips her off. “Yeah, thanks a lot, guys.”

“You’re welcome,” says Sypha.

“Our pleasure,” says Adrian.

Trevor can’t help but notice that he still hasn’t moved any closer to the bed, and the hard line of his shoulders hasn’t softened, however much he’s laughing along with their jokes.

Trevor catches Sypha’s eye, and she nods; she sees it too. “Come on Adrian,” she says, with a click of her tongue that’s half sympathy and half annoyance, “What is it?”

He shrugs.

Trevor sighs. “Look, all jokes aside, if you want to just- I mean, worst case scenario, we could probably just admit we aren’t actually dating, right? Like how angry would your dad really be if we just-”

“No!” says Adrian, a little too fast to be truly considered casual – and then, “No,” again, more softly. “Um. No. It’s not- that’s not. Uh. That won’t be necessary. It’s not- the dating thing is fine. Honestly.”

Trevor doesn’t quite know if he’s relieved to hear that or not.

Sypha sighs, kneading her palms into Trevor’s side like a cat, her brow furrowed slightly in concentration. “What is it?”

He groans. “I- look, promise you won’t freak out about this.”

“I promise,” says Sypha, fast enough that she can't possibly have put any kind of thought into it.

“I- yeah, sure, I promise too,” says Trevor, mostly because there’s no point trying to argue it now Sypha’s made her decision. Also, Adrian visibly relaxes when she says it, and watching the stupid handsome idiot wind himself up isn’t exactly Trevor’s idea of fun – not unless he’s the one causing it, of course. _That’s_ hilarious.

Adrian uncoils slightly, resting his chin in his hands with an artful sigh. “Fine,” he says, a little stiffly, “I’m thirsty.”

“Why?” says Trevor, unsure what the hell this has to do with anything. “Didn’t you just finish Sypha’s coke? Do you want me to go get you another, or-”

Sypha kicks his leg.

“What?! What, I’m being nice, what-”

Adrian chuckles. “Sorry, I forgot we had the village idiot with us. Not that kind of thirsty, Trevor.”

Trevor blinks. “Like… you’re horny?”

“Oh my god,” says Sypha, very quietly.

“No!” says Adrian, the very faintest hint of a flush struggling to fight its way up across his alabaster cheeks. “No, Trevor, for god’s sake. Can you get your mind out of the gutter for two fucking minutes?”

Trevor frowns. “Alright, ok but then what do you- oh. _Oh.”_ Oh, shit, _that_ kind of thirsty. Oh, that’s not good. Maybe he should have insisted on getting some more of that holy water out of the trunk after all. “Right,” he says, slowly, “because you forgot to drink any blood before we left and now- right. Erm. Do you definitely not, like… have some with you? Like a little vampire capri-sun, or something?”

Adrian treats him to one of his more virulently disdainful glares. “If I did, I can assure you I would have drunk it. But no. No blood. It’s, ah,” he waves an airy hand, “it’s fine, I just need to wait until my mother comes to pick us up, and she’ll bring some with her. Just… in the meantime I suppose I’d rather not get too close to the pair of you. It’s, ah…” His eyes run over them both as he searches for a word to describe whatever he’s feeling, his gaze slow and careful and curious in a way that makes the hairs on the back of Trevor’s neck stand on end. There’s something very old and very, very cruel somewhere in the back of that gaze, and it doesn’t scare Trevor half as much as he would like it to.

“Unpleasant?” says Trevor, because he really _really_ needs this to be an unpleasant situation and not an awkward-boner-he-doesn’t-even-begin-to-know-how-to-explain situation.

Adrian licks his lips. “Something like that.”

Abruptly, Sypha gasps. “Oh!”

Adrian blinks, turning his head in mild confusion, and just like that the tension is gone. Thankfully. “What?” he says.

“It's just, now you say it, I- I’ve just,” breathes Sypha, clearly fighting back a laugh, “I’ve just realised what you look like.”

Adrian raises an eyebrow at the sudden change in tone. “What I look like?”

She cackles. “Because you’re sat over there all- Trevor, you see it right, how he’s all tensed up and breathing a bit funny, right?”

“… sure.”

“Well it’s- you know-” Sypha snorts, trying to gather herself to speak properly and ending up bent almost double on the bed with laughter while they both stare at her in utter bafflement, “it’s- you know the scene-”

Trevor glances at Adrian, who looks equally lost. “What are you-”

“With- in the biology class with the fan and the- you know, with the-”

“Pardon?” says Adrian.

“Twilight,” Sypha manages to gasp out between gales of laughter, “it’s- it’s that fucking face he pulls when Bella comes in and he-”

“Shut _up_ ,” says Adrian, grabbing a pillow from the bed and pelting Sypha straight in the face at point-blank range.

She rolls backward without resistance – only a muffled shriek of, “Am I wron- AH!” as she goes tumbling almost over the edge of the bed and has to catch herself abruptly.

“Christ,” Adrian wheezes, the most undignified, watery-eyed laugh bursting forth as he clutches the table for support, “No,” he says, weakly, “nooo, Sypha, why would you-”

“Am I wrong?” she says, scrambling back upright with a wild grin and an accusatory finger pointed straight at him.

“No,” he sputters, “but-” and then the rest is lost in another fit of giggles.

Trevor – who has been the unwilling third party to many a Twilight argument over the years – finds himself grinning at the pair of them, not really because he understands why this is all quite so funny, but just because it’s nice to see them both laugh.

He’s still grinning when Sypha wipes away one last tear and says, “Anyway, all that aside – if you’re thirsty, you can just drink one of us, right? I mean, based on what I’ve read about half-vampires, you should only need half a pint, if that, so you’re more than welcome to-”

She’s up and halfway off the bed toward Adrian before Trevor realises what she’s saying, and reaches out to grab her arm. “Woah, woah, hold on a second there-”

She pulls away with a displeased little wrinkling of her nose. “Trevor, it’s just blood – don’t be difficult, please.”

“I’m not being difficult! I just have more blood.”

She cocks her head. “What?”

“I have more blood, right? I mean, there’s more of me, so it follows I probably have more blood to spare, so-”

She rolls her eyes. “Trevor, it’s a half pint at most, I’ve literally donated more than that to blood drives on multiple occasions. I think I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, but-” Trevor sighs, and cuts himself off before he does something stupid like saying he cares about her. Instead he turns to Adrian with a shrug, and says, “Alright, well, I’m just saying – you have options, fangs.”

Adrian looks… surprisingly affected by all this. Maybe it’s just the light, or the remnants of his earlier laughing fit, but he looks distinctly misty-eyed. “I- you- really?” he says, after a moment.

“Sure,” says Trevor, trying to play it off with a shrug, “I mean, it makes more sense than you sleeping in the car, right?”

Sypha nods. “Right! Yes, far more sense.”

Adrian puts his chin in his hands and fixes Trevor with a long, thoughtful stare. “So you’re not bothered by the whole Belmont thing, or the son of Dracula thing, or-”

Trevor laughs. “I mean, if I was bothered by _that_ , would I be in a budget motel room with you pretending to be your boyfriend so that you can save face with your parents?”

Adrian grins. “I guess not. Still. Uh… hmm. Thank you.” He’s drifted over to the bed in that weird motionless-motion way he does sometimes – Trevor never quite sees him move, but suddenly he’s close enough to rest a cool hand on his cheek as he mutters a quiet, “I appreciate it, Belmont.”

Trevor clears his throat, and if he does so a bit more loudly than he strictly needs to, that’s his business. “So, uh, should I take my shirt off, or…?”

Adrian chuckles. “For the bite? No, I- much as I appreciate the offer, I think Sypha might be a wiser choice.”

“What?” says Trevor, trying not to focus on how weird it is to be offended that your friend doesn’t want to bite you, “Why?”

“Better pain tolerance,” says Sypha, smugly, and then, “Oooh, should _I_ take my shirt off?”

Adrian doesn’t have enough blood in him to blush, it seems, but Trevor recognises that expression. “No, I- a rolled-up sleeve should be fine,” he splutters, “the neck is actually – I mean, you can do it, in theory, but it’s near a bunch of important things, and, uh, it’s more- well, it-”

“It hurts more?” asks Sypha, unbuttoning her cuff so she can roll one of her sleeves up.

“Erm, no- it shouldn’t hurt at all, wherever it’s done – or, uh, it might do a little, but-”

“Well, I’m sure I can handle it,” she says, finishing tucking in her sleeve. “Just try not to spill, ok? This shirt is new and I kind of like it.”

“It’s supposed to be quite pleasant,” says Trevor, dredging up some dusty old Belmont Library book from the deep recesses of his mind, “although it depends on the intent, right? Or the prior relationship? Something like that.”

Adrian laughs. “Is that what the Belmonts are saying? What a load of bullshit.”

“It’s not bullshit,” says Trevor – he’s playing affronted, but there’s no sting in it. “It’s ancient wisdom.” After a moment, he tucks his chin into his hand, and says, “So… what is it like, then?”

Adrian shrugs. “Honestly? I know that there’s a mild anaesthetic in vampire saliva, and some kind of sedative. But what it feels like beyond that… no idea.”

“What?! How can you not know?”

“Well, I’ve never been bitten, have I?”

Trevor scratches his nose. “That’s kind of a more boring answer than I was expecting.”

“That’s life,” says Adrian. “More boring than you expect. Sypha, if you could give me your hand…”

She obliges, resting the back of her hand lightly in his palm and turning away a little as he bends his mouth toward her wrist.

“Do you want a warning?” he murmurs. “Countdown?”

“No, just do it,” She says, shaking her head and turning to Trevor with the air of somebody mostly speaking to keep herself distracted. “I suppose the real question isn’t ‘how does it feel to be bitten’, but rather, ‘how does it feel to bite’, which _-ah!”_ She stiffens slightly, and although she keeps talking, Trevor’s gaze is drawn to Adrian - to his pale mouth pressed against Sypha’s wrist, and the concentrated furrow of his brow, and the slow, steady shift of his throat as he drinks.

It’s over faster than Trevor can process what the fuck kind of emotion _that_ makes him feel. Adrian licks Sypha’s wrist once, briskly, and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand as he pulls back - and if there’s a flash of blood at the tip of his tongue, the motion is too swift for Trevor to be entirely sure he really saw it. And then it’s done. Sypha touches her wrist with interest. It’s unmarked and unblemished and, if Trevor hadn’t just watched the whole thing unfold, he’d be hard pressed to say he believed any blood-drinking had happened here at all.

“Huh,” says Sypha, lightly. “Oh, that’s so clever. Look at that!”

Adrian stands up abruptly, his face flushing a familiar shade of pink. “Oh,” he says, after a moment, and then; “ _Hmm_.”

“Better?” says Trevor, eyeing him with some concern. He looks… keyed up, somehow.

“Better,” says Adrian, with a certain shortness in his tone that makes the statement decidedly unconvincing, “Yes. Better. I should- I need to shower.”

And with that, grabs one of his many understandably expensive-looking leather bags off the table, and high-tails it into the bathroom before either of the others can say anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I've not posted in a while because life is chaos, but here's something to tide you all over while I go through all the lovely comments that have been left and that I've not had a minute to reply to! I can't promise that the update schedule is going to get any less erratic, but perhaps that's part of the charm. (I know it's a pain, I'm sorry, but I'm spread too thin lately to write much of anything unless I'm REALLY in the mood to do it.)
> 
> Thank you as always to the many, many, wonderful comments you folks have left, and for the kudos - the past few months have been very stressful for me (as they've no doubt been for so many of us), and reading your kind words never fails to put a smile on my face and a spring in my step. I love you all <3


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